Joseph Mallord William Turner

Caernarvon Castle with Ships and Boats

c.1798–9

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In Tate Britain

Prints and Drawings Room

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Artist
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Part of
Academical Sketchbook
Medium
Dimensions
Support: 140 x 216 mm
Collection
Tate
Acquisition
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Reference
D01861
Turner Bequest XLIII 42

Catalogue entry

Made with the page turned horizontally, this is a slight sketch in which the identity of the castle becomes, as in some other adjacent studies, difficult to determine precisely; compare the contemporary Studies for Pictures sketchbook (Tate D04102; Turner Bequest LXIX 88). However, the present drawing relates closely to the others in this group executed in blue wash, on the versos of folios 42, 43, 44 and 45 (D01860, D01862, D01864, D01866; Turner Bequest XLIII 41a, 42a, 43a, 44a) and so is almost certainly an idea for the large watercolour exhibited in 1799, Caernarvon Castle (private collection).1

Andrew Wilton
May 2013

1
Andrew Wilton, J.M.W. Turner: His Life and Work, Fribourg 1979, p.328 no.254, pl.47 (colour).

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